


The Trigger

by MeZaKi93



Category: Trying Human
Genre: Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-09
Updated: 2016-09-09
Packaged: 2018-08-14 01:57:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7994410
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MeZaKi93/pseuds/MeZaKi93
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the end, Shade has to make a decision when she sees what is left to her and their species.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Trigger

 

She knew, for a long time now, that their fate was inevitable. She just didn't think - she _hoped_ it wouldn't be her who had to pull the trigger.

Shade sent a mental order to the consol to call back the drone from Earth that she sent to follow their commander, to be her eyes above that hidden place in the desert. The recording played on the monitor again and again by her word and in the end, she was left staring at the deep, smoking crater where the base called Area 51 used to stand.

She knew her commander found what he was looking for. The feeling _burst_ into the collective, and, thus fulfilling his purpose, their First departed.

Fulfillment. What a strange feeling - and to her, unknown, only felt through others indirectly. Through the commander. Through Hue, who she let go for the last time and didn't return. Through Pigment, who found her happiness after many sacrifices with the human man.

And what was left to her?

For many years it had been her task to keep their mission going. However, it became more and more apparent their efforts were futile. The hybrids, even after trying their hardest, were still not viable for long. The human body rejected their genetic material as did their bodies the humans'. They were too different and the Greys' genetic variability couldn't have been lower.

They were now mere copies of each other, with less and less unique features with each generations. A species on the road straight to extinction.

Earth’s mankind would have been their last hope. The last anchor their commander held onto - and he found his fulfillment.

And what about her...? Her fulfillment would have been if she could have saved their species. Their species that was too far to be saved.

It was not the first time the thought emerged in Shade's mind. Now, looking at the picture of the smoking desert crater, the remains of the explosion no living creature could have survived, the thought solidified. The mission and their fate was fully in her hands. With Hue gone, there stood no one above her in the command chain.

She knew Tone suspected, even though she became quite good at hiding her thoughts over the centuries. She could see from the lights inside his eyes, the sound of his thoughts. He was even quieter than usual and he didn't object. Shade didn't know if he was disappointed - he just looked at her without scorn or acceptance, loyal to her to the end since that was his assigned task.

That was his task. And she had no one else.

Everyone whom she had grown just a little attached to had been torn from her or abandoned her. So what was left to her? A fragment of a species, a mission beyond hope, a cause nobody believed in anymore. No one who would have shown her how to live, how to find her freedom like the commander and Hue did.

There was only one logical step forward.

_What will the Draconians think?_

_Not our problem._

_What will Hue think?_

_Hue is not a part of us._

So it was her task to pull the trigger. Since no one else would.

She barely saw Tone tilt his head ever so slightly to the side or felt him receive a mental call, but she didn't have time to care what it was. She turned around and walked out of the monitoring room. She drifted down the corridors of the vast ship like a ghost, the murmurs of the collective getting fainter in her mind. Her body felt light, as if she just stepped out of this ridiculous caricature of a living creature and her vision faded to the pure greyness of the place surrounding her.

She didn't have to think about the way, her feet carried her straight to her destination. It was a place no one but the commander had the right to enter and he only showed her once, so she knew, just in case, where she could end it all if necessary.

Her mind was empty when she stepped in. The lights shone up automatically when her presence was sensed. She was deep in the ship's main column, in the central area left untouched since its construction. In the middle of the small room a long, rod-like machine was attached to the column - and with that, to the whole ship -, its only feature a red button. Inside it a sphere resided full of a homogenic mass of particles only mere centimeters from an igniter, and the igniter was attached to the button. The resulting explosion would be mute in the vacuum of space and would glow like novae in the blackness.

And now the red button shone like a siren's call in the silence.

Shade felt empty. She knew she was the only one who cared. The Draconians - they were only tolerating them. And the humans whom they used to help themselves would never know about them, would never know about their fate. No one ever cared about them.

And the emptiness was strangely satisfying. She had the privilege to pull the trigger and end it all. Like a fulfillment.

Shade let her vision fade away and her shoulders sag. It was the logical step. A tremor ran through her body, the first fragment of emotion she experienced since times forgotten. She took another step. Her hand hovered above the button, its red light shining through her fingers. She let her hand fall down to her side then gathered the strength to raise it again. The red light filled her vision. Red, like the girl's hair she almost, _almost_ didn't lose.

She felt cold.

"Shade!"

No, she certainly didn't feel her rush in, didn't sense her calling her name. Or the warm hand that grabbed her arm. Or the terrified flickers of Hue and Tone's permanent presence. She was certainly _alo_ _—_

"Shade!"

She was yanked. And pulled. Light poured into her eyes, the Earth's pale sphere outside the window. And there was red. On her chest, around her waist, while the other was holding her hand and looked at her with big, frightened blue eyes, an imitation of a human's face. And it was tickling her face. Lots and lots of red.

**Author's Note:**

> All characters belong to Emy Bitner as part of her webcomic, Trying Human. This one-shot has been posted with her permission and is dedicated to her amazing work.
> 
> Tell me what you think :)


End file.
